Which reminds me of a news item:Originally Posted by Dreadnaught
The German army held a joint exercise with the Polish army. During this exercise, some German tanks rumbled through a Polish village. While driving through this village, an officer on top of one of the tanks remarked to one elderly bystander at the roadside: "Well, grandpa, you probably didn't think we'd be back quite so soon, eh?"
Much hilarity and disciplinary actions ensued.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
Can you please explain how the peace-mongers stopped the Cold War from becoming hot?
I think the so-called "hawks" aren't proposing anything much more than NATO. Because we all know that many countries are upholding their NATO obligations in name only, with claptrap militaries that can't really do much. The [West] Germans for years were very smart about this for obvious reasons.
That's great.
They're no match for nukes, which is the point.
In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.
Exactly. The Dems are essentially a moderate party, as illustrated by their terror of actually doing anything liberal. If they were liberal, they'd be completely out of power.
America is a country where the John Birch Society, formerly anathema to anybody with political aspirations, is now calling the shots. It's also a society where certain people who are most definitely nowhere near liberal can call themselves that.
Nessus - I suspect that this is another thread in which you and I will be talking past each other, but I'll give it a brief try. I'm not even sure I completely understand what you're getting at, but here goes:
Generally, I feel like you take isolated bits of political rhetoric from different people and amalgamate it into a whole that makes sense from your perspective. In reality, I think things are much more complex. I will freely admit that there are things that are quite distasteful about the platforms and rhetoric of major political parties in the US - in fact, I suspect it is pretty much a universal rules about politics. I'm also a little confused about how human rights gets into this. True, the US political spectrum tends to spend more time talking about what we deserve rather than what we should do (a subtle distinction that I think plagues most Western discourse), but I don't think most of our political posturing really addresses the issue of fundamental human rights - or, if it does, only glancincly. American voters care far more about how a policy will affect them personally (oftentimes, their pocketbooks) rather than a nebulous discussion of right and wrong. Of course, that doesn't mean that we shouldn't have the conversation about human rights but it doesn't feature high on the list of politically relevant topics. Thus, trying to frame the election in this light may be misleading.
Onto a few specifics:
First off, you rarely have to 'show yourself worthy' of housing or healthcare - quite the opposite. You have to prove you're poor enough to get either - the poorer you are, the easier it is to obtain the basics. It's the working poor who are stuck, and that's a fault of the specifics of our system and not some messed-up moralism.
I think the issue is not that most decent people feel that those less fortunate than us should be helped out with basic necessities - food, clothing, shelter, etc. - but that to expand the rubric of fundamental rights too much both dilutes its essence, and lays a heavy burden on the individual. Perhaps this is merely a matter of definitions - in my view (and much of America's, I think), a fundamental human right is something that cannot be taken away, and upon which most of society is based. A right is also something that we should vigorously support around the world, not merely for our own citizens/residents. Something like quality healthcare is important and something that should be available for everyone in our country, but viewing it through a lens of rights distorts the debate away from the nuts-and-bolts reality. Thus, we provide at least basic care for our poor and elderly, but insist that most individuals have to fend for themselves. In fact, this 'fending for oneself' results in a natural equilibrium where care is theoretically not overutilized. Ditto for shelter, etc. Of course our system has many flaws that need to be corrected, but that's irrelevant to the question of rights.
Put simply, most 'rights' in the US sense of the word don't necessitate action, but generally inaction. They are freedoms accorded to the individual, not entitlements. Classically, Roosevelt put it nicely with his 'four freedoms' speech, but you get the idea. The only action required in most cases is to protect the rights of individuals or groups from those who would take them away, but not establishing vast worldwide programs to guarantee other 'rights' for every individual.
There's a reason the US hasn't ratified the ICESCR but has ratified the ICCPR; we feel that civil and political freedoms are more 'inalienable' rights than economic or social rights. It's not being heartless - hardly, we agree that the provisions of the ICESCR are definite good goals to strive for all over the world for a better society, and we should model our policies after that goal.
Uhm? We have a basic social safety net for those who don't work, and provide more generous provisions for children than adults. The only question in comparison to other Western nations is a matter of degree. The US, as is usual for our philosophy, generally feels that to provide too generous of a cushion disincentivizes hard work. A better approach in our opinion is to make policies that minimize the suffering while still not keeping a large unemployed underclass subsisting on handouts. It's a tough balance to strike, and clearly the US has a long way to go. But it's hardly 'asking people for papers when they want shelter and food'. I think you're just using hyperbole here, but that's because it's the only way your comparisons make any sense.In the heat of the Cold War, this kind of thinking would've been used as ammunition against the Commies! You have to work for the Evil Communist State or they slaughter you! So how is it okay that today the right-wing ding-bats get to say "you have to work for the Evil Corporate State or your children starve!" and they're the good guys?
They're the guys you have a beer with. And doesn't it just make you think, anyway, and all that Devil's advocate bull-shit Dread's on and on about? The GOP stands for some values the US public loves. Those values amount to asking people for their papers when they want shelter and food.
Look, I didn't touch your comment in the other thread because I didn't want to open that can of worms. I'm sorry if you felt it was a guilt-laden argument; I was trying to argue nuts and bolts of a budgetary process rather than a moral comparison of NHS and the defence budget (or the science budget, education budget, pension budget, whatever). That was started by someone else (Steely, maybe?) and ignored the budgetary reality: NHS' budget has ballooned in size far out of proportion to the population or economy, while some of the other budgets (that I also find important) had not. Why exempt one of the most expensive and bloated budgets from some efficiency savings? That was not a moral condemnation of NHS or foreign aid in comparison to other important budget items, but rather a plea for a more balanced approach to a budget with many very important programs - NHS included. *shrugs* Also, I get that you're upset but I'd appreciate a somewhat more toned-down discussion when discussing individual forum members.I cannot reconcile these values with what I perceive to be a good person. Wiggin was crying for more carrier fleets from the UK, and he made a guilt-laden argument that providing health-care to useless Pakis should've been cut instead of naval threats to the Chinks. He acted as a moral authority doing that, too.
I don't think this at all, and I don't think most of the cautious Americans on the forum do either (I exempt the obvious demagogues here). Winning elections might be about catering to the masses, but policy (which is what we really debate here) is not. It's about crafting the best policy that takes into account human nature and our goals for a better world. There are valid differences both inside and outside the US about how to best achieve these goals, but the basic goal is the same for everyone - greater happiness and prosperity for all. Ideal policy, of course, rarely gets implemented both because of re-election pressures and because of partisanship. But the Americans here aren't elected officials - we present things as we think they should be, not as they are.The right likes to demonize the unwanted segments of society as an endless gaping maw asking for food. To them, I would extend my arm and help them. Forget about the bull-shit deserve and denigrate apparatus the right-wing ding-a-lings love. We exist, and that alone, DO YOU HEAR ME, that alone creates the moral imperative that we help. THAT WE HELP.
Is that really so much to ask?
Apparently it is, because the right-wing demagogue Lewkowski is allowed to preach his beer-drinking bull-shit in Debate, and his ilk will be voting for Palin come 2012. I look forward to all the rationalizations and pat-me-downs from Wiggin, Dread and other forum econ Intelligentsia. They're the "political realists" who understand that it is necessary to cater to Bubba-Joe in the US political system. And that system does good to whom, exactly?
I personally agree with you that the existence of suffering should spur us as individuals to improve the lot of the disadvantaged of society (I would hesitate to use the term 'unwanted'). Yet policy has to take into account more than the suffering of the one, but the good of the many. Sometimes they can be helped as one, sometimes they can't easily be shoehorned together. It is at this juncture that you get divergent policy choices irrespective of our individual imperative to help the needy.
I will agree that I am hawkish on some issues, but I generally support having a strong Western groups of nations (in both economic and military power) because I favor deterrence over confrontation. Furthermore, I strongly support the use of the US military in non-kinetic operations (e.g. humanitarian aid), which are generally only possible because of our global presence. Lastly, I do not favor an expansion of the military, but rather its maintenance as the preeminent (group of) power(s) in the world. I like Western views of how people should be treated, and those views will only continue to have force so long as we have clout - and military clout is part of that.
Lastly, I don't think you really know what my politics are. Assumptions don't work well here.
Nessus thinks that noticing budgetary matters, rather than looking solely at people who can't buy Axe body spray, is by definition a moral failing. And if pressed Nessus will comfortably admit that it simply isn't possible to maintain any sort of system where people don't exhibit that moral failing, which is simply proof that humankind shouldn't exist.
Is that accurate enough for a condensed summary, Nessus, or did I get something wrong?
Of course, while Nessie wants everyone to be able to be well off, happy, and satisfied, she also feels disdain for anyone in that condition because, well, they act happy, well off, and satisfied. Which indicates that there's something wrong with everyone else and again that humankind should not exist. It's the only way to resolution to the paradox. People who don't have things are deserving and should have them. But if they have them they aren't deserving and shouldn't have them. The problem must be the gordian knot, not the black-and-white interpretation.
Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"
Eh, I don't really see the connections between the dots here. There was MAD at some time in our history that actually worked quite nicely. We have a tendency in Europe (a bit more so in the nothern part) to let the state organise a bit more of our lives than Americans would necesserily want (though you can understand that if you see what madness their bureaucracy gets away with). We have an American two-party system that has worked roughly untill Ronald Reagan and has deteriorated in its functioning ever since. Then fnally we have Europe getting to grips with the fact that if you have many millions of people moving to your land and staying there that's called immigration in any normal dictionary. Europe denied this simple truth and the so-called 'move to the right' is little more than a protest against the elites denying the obvious; that we have immigration and that it needs to be addressed.
But, there is no connection.
Last edited by Hazir; 11-01-2010 at 08:08 AM.
Congratulations America
About the original OP, I for one usually disagree with the statement that Healthcare, Housing, etc. being a human right because in my mind human rights are things which cost nothing to provide and, like was stated in our Declaration of Independence,
...that the rights of Life and Liberty are inherent to people. A government does not need to have income, or do anything at all to ensure that they don't take them away, or interfere with them. The same as well goes for the pursuit of Happiness. I cite the Declaration of Independence not as some worshiping of old men as you have insinuated in the past for other posters, but because it was written by people who had experience and understanding of the philosophies regarding the very things they discussed in its text. While Healthcare, Housing, etc. are nice things, they are not things that every government is capable of providing to its people, or even innately inherent to human beings. I can be free, alive, and pursue that which makes me happy, but if I fall ill, or another person falls ill, I cannot manifest healthcare out of thin air for them or myself, and by its very nature housing and food are limited resources.
This does not mean however that goverments of a sufficient level, like those in Europe, or the that of the United States, should not provide these other things to its citizens. It just seems awkward and illogical that they should be paired with things that are effectively free, have to be taken away for them to be limited or non-existent, and have no hard set limit on how much of them there can be.
. . .
Yeah, I'm unclear about where to draw the line on rights.
Funny thing is that we've had to be practically militant about getting rights recognized in the US. Women not voting until 1921? Worse, Johnson having to shove through the civil rights acts? That's a national shame. Likewise with gay marriage. Also abortion.
Also, clarification on the Pursuit of Happiness, which seems to be a tripping point for some people. Basically this means exactly what it says. I am free to pursue that which makes me happy, and the government will not interfere with that pursuit. It does not mean that the government has to guarantee my success in it. For instance, if my pursuit of happiness involves the desire to consume at least one chocolate bar a day, the government will not hinder me in my search for, purchase, creation, or consumption of said chocolate bar, or in any other thing that could be related to this action. This does not mean that the government will give me a chocolate bar, or that they are somehow violating my right to pursue happiness by not giving me one. It is the right to pursue that which you want, not a guarantee of it. The reason one is guaranteed and not the other, is that one is logically always possible, while the other is not. I can want to eat chocolate bars, and the government can not interfere, regardless of whether there are chocolate bars, or my ability to eat them. If however it was a guarantee of my happiness, somehow the government would be violating my rights if there were no chocolate bars, the government was unable to obtain one for myself, I failed to obtain one myself, or I was unable to eat them.
Last edited by Illusions; 11-01-2010 at 05:45 PM. Reason: Words why do I keep forgetting to include them!?
. . .
Pursuit of happiness actually means the right to private property. Pursuit of happiness just sounded better.
Hope is the denial of reality
Good lord, are they real? I re-read The Illuminatus! Trilogy recently, and had mentally filed them with the other ludicrous organisations found in that tome (e.g. The John Dillinger Died For You Society)
That's a pity. Perhaps we could learn from Bhutan on this one?
There's a man goin' 'round, takin' names
And he decides who to free and who to blame
Yes, we get hung up on Protect vs Provide. As far as human rights go....
Hmm.. Wiggin made me realise that in some countries some in addition to the traditional human right people also see some social rights as human rights. At least it used to be like that in the Soviet bloc and it wouldn't surprise me if some social rights made it into Finland's constitution.
Congratulations America
As far as I know, almost all of Europe has signed and ratified the ICESCR, including the Netherlands and Turkey. This includes so-called 'economic, social, and cultural' rights. I'm not sure if their definition matches what you mean by social rights, but it's pretty universally accepted in the Western world with the exception of the US, largely due to the aforementioned discomfort at grouping these social/economic/etc. goals with what Americans see as more fundamental human rights in the civil and political realm.
Funny, I'd never even heard of that treaty. It seems to have had a very limited influence on the 1983 Constitution for the Netherlands which does mention them as something the government is supposed to have policies about, but does not guarantee them in any way. Which is totally different from the way classical human rights are guaranteed. Where the classical rights are very precisely described, the government can pretty much go whichever way with a sentence like 'the welfare and distribution of wealth is a subject of policies set by the government'. That could be used as the basis for a communist type economic policy just as easy as for a free-market approach.
Actually, it's a bit funny the US won't ratify that treaty as it is rather harmless.
Congratulations America
The US is pretty choosy about ratifying treaties, even those without teeth. If they disagree with large portions of it, they face a big fight in the Senate getting it ratified. Furthermore, a large proportion of countries that did ratify it had their own reservations about it, explicitly qualifying their ratification with various provisos. This is precisely because the concept of economic and social 'rights' in the same rubric as other fundamental rights is a very new and controversial one.
edit: Wait a second, you never heard of it? It grew right out of the UDHR, which I'm positive you know about. Essentially, the two conventions were the detailed application of the declarations in the UDHR. I'm betting you just haven't heard them referred to by name. They're pretty much the most important documents in international human rights law.
Last edited by wiggin; 11-02-2010 at 02:22 AM.
the irony of a godless socialist championing Christian values to a political party that fancies itself the party of God. The other irony is Billy Bob What The Fuck isn't championing the values of the Right Wing so much as being spoon fed and mesmerized by the RW's propaganda Mean Machine. There's a whole pot of boiling shit underlying how people can be so cold and uncaring for the unprivileged while at the same time pretending to be the Christian opposite. If I wasn't typing on this awful EyePad, I'd BS you some more about it. Suffice it to say if the mythos is real, they've proven the warnings of Satan's seductive ways.
The Rules
Copper- behave toward others to elicit treatment you would like (the manipulative rule)
Gold- treat others how you would like them to treat you (the self regard rule)
Platinum - treat others the way they would like to be treated (the PC rule)
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote